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What Is 
A Christian? 

By James E. ClarKe 
















COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 














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WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 

and 

What Is It to Believe on Christ ? 


By 

James E. Clarke 

K 


The Advancb Publishing Company 
Nashville, Tennessee 



Si 


Copyright, 1923 

By The Advance Publishing Company 



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MAY -4 *23 


©C1A70 4442 


INTRODUCTION 


If some critic should arise from reading the follow¬ 
ing pages to say, “the book is a mere primer” such 
a judgment would be accepted by the author as high 
praise, for it would indicate that he had accomplished 
what he set out to do. His object has been to set 
forth in brief form and simple language, and for 
the use of the average Christian, some first lessons 
in Christianity as life. 

The motive back of the chapters that follow has 
been to help the average Christian by removing some 
of the misconceptions which are common and whicn 
cause distress to earnest souls. There are those who 
are disturbed because they fall so far short of what 
they conceive to be an ideal Christian life. Indeed, 
young people are frequently met, who express them¬ 
selves as ready to abandon all effort to live the Chris¬ 
tian life because they are so conscious of their short¬ 
comings. Such persons will be helped and encouraged 
if they can grasp the truth that the Christian life, 
just because it is a life, involves struggle and growth. 
Others are distressed because they cannot accept some 
of the views held by fellow Christians, or because they 
are not conscious of the kind of personal experience of 
which others tell. These will be comforted and strength- 



Introduction 


ened if they are brought to realize that in its essence 
Christianity is an inner attitude and purpose. Still 
others are perplexed by the obvious fact that some per¬ 
sons who do not profess to be Christians seem to be liv¬ 
ing on a higher moral plane than the average church 
member, and by the criticism which denounces as hypo¬ 
crites those professing Christians who so evidently fall 
far short of “the perfect man.” It is hoped that these 
pages will relieve some of that perplexity. 

The method followed is not accidental but has 
been deliberately adopted. The author has endeavored 
to achieve two ends. The first is simplicity of state¬ 
ment. The second is the focusing of light from var¬ 
ious angles upon a single essential truth. Phrases 
full of meaning to the minister have been avoided, 
because they are meaningless or misleading to the 
average Christian. When used at all, terms which 
are common to the pulpit and the religious press are 
explained in the ordinary language of “the man in the 
street,” for whom the book is prepared. At least, such 
has been the author’s aim, though it is difficult to avoid 
the unconscious use of phrases in common use by the 
preacher and religious journalist. Because of the pur¬ 
pose in view, there is much which may justly be criticis¬ 
ed as reiteration. Indeed, the trained student may find 
the whole thought of the book concentrated in a single 
sentence, and he may count all the rest as mere pad¬ 
ding ; but the average Christian is not a trained student, 
and for that reason the effort has been put forth de- 


— 4 — 


Introduction 


liberately to lead up to the one centrfal truth by 
various avenues of approach. 

The concern of these pages is with Christianity 
as life, with what may be called the “vital principle” 
of our religion. Their concern is not with doctrine, nor 
tradition, nor even, except incidentally, with the var¬ 
ious manifestations of the vital principle as it expresses 
itself in human affairs. The Christian life is not 
confined to any single intellectual or practical or even 
moral expression. It cannot be, just because it is 
primarily a life, and life always develops and mani¬ 
fests itself differently in proportion to its develop¬ 
ment. Our concern, however, is not with the mani¬ 
festations except so far as they may help us to de¬ 
termine whether the life itself is present. Our pur¬ 
pose, rather, is to help men answer the question, 
“Am I a Christian ?” It is to help them see that to 
be a real Christian means that one has actually be¬ 
gun to live a certain kind of life, which life, like all 
life, begins as a mere germ, so to speak, and must 
develop—“first the blade, then the ear, then the full 
corn in the ear.” 

To describe, not to explain, is what is attempted in 
these chapters. The effort to explain belongs to the- 
ology, though even theology has more than its hands full 
when it undertakes to explain life, and science and 
philosophy are equally helpless. But it is possible 
to describe what we cannot explain, and to some ex¬ 
tent it is possible to describe life. It is certainly 
— 5 — 


Introduction 


possible to distinguish between one kind or type of 
life and another—between vegetable and animal life, 
for instance, or between physical and mental life. Our 
effort, therefore, is merely to point out as definitely 
as possible the distinction between the individual life 
that is Christian and the individual life that is not 
Christian. Of course, as individuals associate them¬ 
selves together we at once have a social life that is 
Christian, or not Christian, or more or less Christian; 
but the range of this book is not intended to cover the 
social aspects of the Christian life, but only its char¬ 
acteristics as pertaining to the individual. 

If in any measure these pages help to remove mis¬ 
conceptions, to hearten Christians, to give a more 
spiritual content to the term “faith,” and, above all, 
to bring some into a closer relationship with Him who 
is “the Way, the Truth, and the Life” the writer will 
feel that he has received abundant reward. 


6 


CONTENTS 


PART I. WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN? 

I. A Question of Life Attitude. 

II. A Question of Life Purpose. 

III. The Christian and the Church Member. 

VI. The Christian versus th!e Moralist. 

V. The Christian versus the Not Chris¬ 
tian. 

VI. Not Full-Grown but Growing. 

VII. Not a Graduate but a Pupil. 

VIIT. Not a Conqueror but a Combatant. 

IX. Not a Saint but a Sinner. 

X. Not Saved but Being Saved. 

XI. Not a Euler but a Servant. 

XII. One With God in Purpose. 

PART II. WHAT IS IT TO BELIEVE ON CHRIST? 


— 7 — 






- 































WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN ? 


I. A Question of Life Attitude. 

A college student came with the question, “Why, 
when the people are already Christians, is it necessary 
to send missionaries to South America?” The answer 
was: “Because most of them are believed to be merely 
nominal Christians.” College man though he was, the 
word “nominal” did not convey a clear picture to his 
mind and he asked its meaning. Of course, be was told 
that it meant, “in name only.” Ours is called a Chris¬ 
tian nation because the dominant religion is the Chris¬ 
tian religion, as distinguished from Mohammedanism, 
Buddhism, or some other religious faith and form; but 
many, if not most, of our citizens are ; Christians in 
name only. In attempting to answer the question, What 
is a Christian? we are not to think of the persons who 
are Christians in name only. Rather, our question 
grow T s out of the conviction that there are real Chris¬ 
tians, as well as merely nominal Christians, and that, 
in his inner being, the real Christian is sufficiently 
different from the person who is not a Christian to 
make it possible so to describe and define him that 
this difference will be apparent. 

In the conversation just mentioned the fact was 
brought out that on the whole the Christianity of 
— 9 — 



10 


What Is a Christian? 


South America gives evidence of being merely an out¬ 
ward, formal affair. When the Spaniards discovered 
and settled that land, they baptised natives by the 
thousands and counted every person so baptised as a 
Christian. Ever since most of the professed Christians 
of South America seem to have held to the view that 
to accept as true the teachings of the church and to 
conform to its outward requirements is what makes one 
a Christian. To be sure, some, or many, may be Chris¬ 
tians in the inner life and spirit and purpose, Chris¬ 
tians in fact as well as in outward form. Only God can 
judge the individual case. The distinction is made, 
however, because it is possible for one to be a Chris¬ 
tian in an outward, formal sense without differing in 
his inner life and spirit from persons who do not even 
claim to be Christians. 

It is probably a fair statement that every spiritual 
reality takes form in a body or bodies. For instance, 
all are familiar with a reality commonly called the 
“spirit of democracy.” It is the inner conviction that 
the right or best kind of government is government 
by all the people. Now, that democratic spirit, or ideal, 
takes form as a republic, like ours. It is easy to realize 
that one might conform outwardly to our form of 
government and yet be at heart a monarchist, pluto¬ 
crat, socialist, or something else. So one may conform 
to outward, formal Christianity without being a 
Christian at heart. Christianity is in its essence a 
way of life, characterized in the New Tes 
tament as “the way.” It takes form in numerous 


A Question of Life Attitude 


11 


ways, chiefly two: First, as a “body of truth” 
generally believed—its theological form; second 
ly, as an organized body of persons—its insti 
tutional form. The Apostles’ Creed, for instance, 
puts in verbal form what Christians generally believe; 
but one may accept the statements of the creed as 
being true and yet not even try to shape his life in 
accordance with that truth. So one may join the church 
and comply with its outward requirements without be¬ 
ing a Christian in spirit. Our question applies neither 
to the merely nominal Christians nor to the merely 
formal Christians. Rather we seek to discover what 
the real Christian actually is in his inner being and 
spirit. 

In its essence, Christianity is not a name nor a form 
but a life. That is the definite teaching of Scripture. 
The Christian is one “born again,” “born of the Spirit.” 
“He that hath the Son hath life.” Jesus himself said 
that he had come into the world that men “might 
have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” 
This is the very center of New Testament teaching. 
Moreover, human experience shows that there is cer¬ 
tainly a reality known among men as “the Christian 
life.” It manifests itself in various ways, but our 
concern in what follows is only incidentally with those 
manifestations. Rather we seek to discover what that 
Christian life itself is like. At bottom, all religion is 
a matter of one’s attitude toward God. A man’s mere 
belief about God does not make him a religious man— 
“the devils also believe and tremble”—and are devils 


12 


What Is a Christian? 


still. What makes a man “religious” is that (by what¬ 
ever process) he comes to assume a certain attitude 
toward God. So, what makes a man a Christian in 
the vital sense, in his own inner being, is that he 
comes to assume a certain life-attitude toward God as 
revealed in Jesus Christ. Our business is to try to 
discover what is that Christian attitude. 

From what precedes it is evident that our concern 
is with a^ fact, not with the explanation of a fact. 
That common experience of men, that attitude toward 
God known as the Christian life, is a fact. What we 
call theology is an attempt to explain that fact. It 
undertakes to tell us what God is, what man is, how 
man came to sustain a wrong attitude toward God, 
how he is brought into the right, or Christian, attitude, 
and much more. It is said that theology “attempts,” 
that it “undertakes,’’ because there are numerous theol¬ 
ogies, numerous attempted explanations, and all can¬ 
not be right. However, the fact with which theology 
deals remains the same, whether one’s theology is 
good, bad or indifferent, whether it explains or only 
befuddles. Experience comes first; then explanation. 
The first theology must have been the first opinion 
ever expressed in the effort to explain an experience 
of God. That opinion may have been correct or sadly 
in error, but the success or failure of any attempted 
explanation cannot change in the slightest degree the 
reality of an experience. Millions have had a physical 
experience called malaria. Once it was explained as 
due to the miasma of swamps or “night air.” Now it is 


A Question of Life Attitude 


13 


generally believed to be due to germs carried by mos¬ 
quitoes. But tbe experience remains the same, though 
the explanation has changed. Men who experience 
malaria today shiver and shake with chills and burn 
with fever just as men did in Rome centuries ago 
before anyone ever dreamed of the pernicious activity 
of the mosquito. Explanations may differ, but a given 
experience remains the same and can be described with¬ 
out regard to the explanation. In attempting to an¬ 
swer the question, What is a Christian? we are under¬ 
taking not to explain, but to describe. Familiar theo¬ 
logical terms will be deliberately avoided, except for 
purposes of illustration, and the effort will be made to 
describe the Christian attitude so simply that it can 
be distinguished from other life-attitudes even by those 
who have no conscious Christian experience. 


IT. A Question of Life's Ruling Purpose. 

Having clearly in mincl the thought that our pur¬ 
pose is to discover what is that individual attitude 
which is properly called Christian, it may be well at 
the beginning to set down a definition to serve as a 
kind of “working hypothesis.” Really, in his own 
thinking, the writer built his definition out of the con¬ 
siderations which will be set forth later; yet it may be 
helpful to others to have at least a tentative definition 
as a starting point. 

The truth is that there can be no more comprehen¬ 
sive definition of a Christian than the four words 
which naturally form on the lips as one hears the ques¬ 
tion, What is a Christian? Promptly the reply comes: 
“A disciple of Christ.” The whole truth is in that 
statement, yet it is probable that many who use the 
words do not have the whole truth in mind, because 
they do not realize what is involved in the word, “dis¬ 
ciple.” What is a disciple? Why, jof course, he is a 
learner, a pupil; but do we usually stop to think that 
this means that he is only a learner, only a pupil? He 
is not learned; he is just learning. He is not fully de¬ 
veloped; he is just developing. But something more 
is true: The object of the disciple, the pupil, is to re¬ 
ceive what the teacher has to give, to become what the 
teacher would have him become; and all of this is in¬ 
volved in Christian discipleship. The object of it all 
— 14 — 


Question op Lifers Ruling Purpose 15 

is to be what Christ would have the pupil be. With 
the familiar but wonderfully comprehensive definition 
as a basis, therefore, another is suggested. Though 
longer, it is really simpler, because it indicates what is 
meant by the word disciple. This is it: 

A Christian is one whose ruling purpose in life is 
to become conformed, not only outwardly in conduct 
but inwardly in mind and spirit, to the divine ideal, 
as manifested in Jesus Christ. 

Let it be kept in mind that our present concern is 
not with the question how one becomes a Christian. 
It is by faith in Christ, by spiritual regeneration; but 
on this subject we cannot dwell. Our purpose is dif¬ 
ferent. It is to “locate” the Christian, to distinguish 
him from others, to help him “find himself,” to uncover 
characteristics of his inner life, so that others may see 
that it is a mistake to base judgment upon mere con¬ 
duct alone. And let us remember, too, that we are not 
now concerned with what a Christian may or ought to 
be. Whoever he is, he certainly ought to be a bigger 
and better Christian than he is today; but our present 
business is solely to determine what he is. With these 
considerations in mind, let us examine our definition 
with some care, to be sure that we understand what is 
involved. 

In the first place, observe that the definition does 
not refer to a constant purpose, but to a ruling pur¬ 
pose. In fact, so far as we know mien, we know of no 
Christian who would claim that he was absolutely 
true to a single purpose at every moment of his Chris* 


16 


What Is a Christian? 


tian life; yet, though he may be now and again swayed 
by other motives, the true Christian, like the needle to 
the pole, will always swing back to this one purpose as 
the one which rules his life. At times, life will doubt¬ 
less be lived with some other object in view; but we 
conceive the true Christian to be one whose life as a 
whole, from the moment he becomes a Christian, will 
be swayed by this one dominant purpose. 

In the second place, keep ever in mind the fact that 
the purpose of the true Christian is to be conformed 
to a divine ideal—not to any human standard, however 
high and good; not to the requirements of any human 
organization or institution, however near perfection 
it may be; but to an ideal never yet fully attained by 
any human being, though an ideal made manifest in 
the flesh in the person of Jesus Christ, the God-man. 
It is this desire and purpose to attain to a divine ideal 
which distinguishes all truly religious motive from 
other motives which actuate men, and this desire and 
purpose are Christian whenever Jesus Christ is recog¬ 
nized as the manifestation of that divine ideal to which 
men aspire. In still simpler terms, the true Christian 
is one who, however he started, has as his main pur¬ 
pose in life to become like Jesus Christ. 

Further, it appears that our definition applies not 
to a person who has “arrived” but to one who is in 
process of becoming. This distinction is of the utmost 
importance, for it is a common fallacy to think of a 
Christian as one who has attained, or who claims to 
have attained, to certain heights of goodness. Who 


Question of Life's Ruling Purpose 17 

has not noticed, for instance, how school boys are apt 
to treat one of their number who has become a pro¬ 
fessed follower of Christ—as if he had laid claim to 
belonging to a higher caste. The fact is, however, at 
least so far as our definition goes, that to say that a 
person is a Christian affirms nothing at all concern¬ 
ing his place among his fellows as measured by the 
moral scale; it affirms merely that he is one who has 
started on a great adventure, seeking a “pearl of great 
price"—the likeness of Jesus Christ. Even Paul, re¬ 
markable Christian that he was, wrote after he had 
been years on the way: “Not that I have already ob¬ 
tained. ... I count not myself yet to have laid hold; 
but one thing I do. ... I press on toward the 
goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ 
Jesus" That's what made him a Christian—not his 
attainments, but his purpose to attain the ideal. 

But there is in our definition a third great truth 
frequently overlooked. We are often confronted with 
the suggestive question, “What would Jesus do?" But 
there is a much more important question. It is this: 
What was Jesus? The Christian is not one whose 
purpose is merely to imitate the conduct of Jesus, but 
one who seeks to be like him in spirit and do what he 
did for the same reasons which actuated the Master 
himself. And, really, it is easier to be Christ-like in 
conduct than to be Christ-like in spirit. It is easier 
never to appear selfish than it is actually to have no 
selfish will and desire; easier to control the manifesta¬ 
tions of hatred than to overcome all hatred and be 


—2— 


18 


What Is a Christian? 


dominated by the spirit of love; easier to speak the 
word of forgiveness than to banish every unforgiving 
thoifght. The Christian is one who seeks not merely to 
do what Jesus did or would do but to be what Jesus 
was, and this we believe to be the very highest and 
holiest purpose which can actuate a man. Indeed, 
just to do what Jesus did, even to imitate exactly his 
conduct when he was among men and count this out¬ 
ward conformity as essential Christianity, would be 
to miss the mark altogether. There's a world of dif¬ 
ference between Jesus’ day and our iday and he him¬ 
self said that his disciples should do ‘‘greater works.” 
The Christian is one who seeks to be like Jesus in mind 
and Spirit, and as we become like him inwardly we will 
apply that Christ-like mind and spirit to the condi¬ 
tions of our own times. Conditions change and, there¬ 
fore, the manifestation of any given spirit must change 
to suit new conditions; but that which is essential to 
the Christian is the purpose to become like Christ in 
spirit, whether life is spent in the First Century or in 
the Twentieth. 


III. The Christian and the Church Member. 

The church member ought to be a Christian and 
the Christian ought to be a member of a church. 

The fact is, however, that “Christian” and “church 
member” are not synonymous terms, and much con¬ 
fusion and misunderstanding and unjust criticism 
arise out of the failure to discern this truth. If we 
are to make progress in determining the nature of a 
Christian, we will be relieved of a great handicap if 
it is first made clear that to become a member of the 
church does not make one a Christian, except in a 
nominal and very superficial sense. 

Probably there are very few people who join a 
church from some ulterior motive. Most church mem¬ 
bers are doubtless identified with the church either 
because they are convinced that church membership is 
a plain Christian duty or because they think that in 
some unknown manner the church will be a help to the 
development of that higher nature of which they are 
vaguely conscious. Yet it must be admitted that, in a 
time like this, when the church is highly respectable 
and church membership highly “proper’’, self-seeking 
persons may become church members solely because of 
“an eye to business.” 

The tale is told of three brothers, partners in the 
butcher business, who moved into a certain town and 
at once became church members—one a Baptist, one 
— 19 — 


20 


What Is a Christian? 


a Methodist and one a Presbyterian. When asked how 
it happened that they were in different churches, one 
naively (or, perhaps, jokingly) replied, “IPs good for 
the business.” Whether that story is true or not, it is 
altogether possible for persons to be church members 
“for revenue only”, or for social advantage, or for any 
one of a thousand reasons other than because church 
membership is an expression of the Christian purpose 
and life. Yet it is a common thing for people outside 
of the church to form an opinion of the Christian from 
some experiences with a church member, though the 
church member may not be a true Christian at all. 

While it is probable that there are very few such 
hypocrites in the church—just enough to give eloquent 
testimony to the real value of the genuine Christian 
life—yet it can hardly be doubted that our churches 
contain many members who, sincerely, though ignor 
antly, think that to be a church member is equivalent 
to being a Christian, and such deceived persons need 
to have their eyes opened to the truth. 

To be a Christian is not the same as to accept the 
creed or submit to the rites or conform to the practices 
of any church. It is not meant to suggest that these 
normal and customary relations to the church are un¬ 
important. Rather, they are very important; yet they 
are not of the essence of the Christian life. One may 
accept in every detail the most perfect creed—if he 
can find it, one may be as punctilious as the Pharisees 
of old in the observance of ceremonial law and ecclesi¬ 
astical custom, and yet, to the Master’s eye, be only 


Christian and Church Member 


21 


wliat those Pharisees were, “whited sepulchres, which 
outwardly appear beautiful, but inwardly are full of 
dead men’s bones/’ This is because the essence of 
Christianity is in life. Fundamentally, to be a Chris¬ 
tian is not a matter of the intellect or of manners or of 
association, but of the inner spirit and purpose which 
give meaning and direction to the whole of life. To 
have one’s name on the roll of the church is not a sure 
test of one’s standing as a Christian. 

On the other hand, church membership is not to be 
reserved for those who give unmistakable and unvary¬ 
ing evidence of their Christian character. If it were, 
few indeed would be the number of church members. 
The church should, of course, deny membership to any 
who openly deny the Christian purpose and, though it 
may make mistakes, the church may wisely reject as 
members any persons who appear deliberately and per¬ 
sistently to follow courses which are obviously at vari¬ 
ance with that Christian purpose; yet the church, was 
never meant to be an aggregation of perfect or full- 
grown Christians. Tt is merely the organization of 
men, women and children who, whatever their stage 
of development, are disciples, learners, in the school 
of Christ. He whose ruling purpose in life is to be¬ 
come like Christ has a right in the church, even though 
lie has made but little progress toward the realization 
of his purpose, and it is the business and mission of 
the church to help him on his way and to labor for the 
formation of the same purpose in those who have it 
not. 


22 


What Is a Christian? 


It is a mistake, therefore, to judge the church as if 
it were or pretended to be made up of persons excep¬ 
tionally good. It makes no such pretension. It was 
never intended to be an exclusive conservatory for the 
preservation and exhibition of highly developed and 
beautifully flowering spiritual plants. On the con¬ 
trary, it is designed to be a workshop, its force being 
made up of all sorts and kinds of persons of all grades 
of development and efficiency, but held together by 
a common purpose and growing steadily toward the 
divine ideal as they labor together each for the other 
and all for those without. When one is identified 
with this working force the presumption is that he 
is a Christian; but the proof of his discipleship lies 
not in his church membership but in his possession of 
that ruling purpose which prompts men to serve and 
labor together for the common good. 

It has just been said that the church is designed 
to be a workshop. While that is true, it is not the 
whole truth. Some members of the church, and many 
others who should be in the church, are too young 
to be reckoned as workmen, or at any rate as efficient 
workmen, in the great task of building the kingdom 
of God—uot necessarily too young in the years of 
human life, but too young in the Christian life. They 
need to be nurtured and taught and developed. Hence 
the church must be also a nursery and a school for 
the purpose of developing infant Christians into work¬ 
men “that needeth not to be ashamed.” Fortunately 
the churches are at least beginning to realize that 


Christian and Church Member 


23 


it is their business to teach and train the children in 
the human sense of the word, but unfortunately few 
seem to have grasped the truth that persons who are 
humanly mature may be but babes in the spiritual life. 
When a fullgrown man becomes converted and joins 
the church is it not the rule to think of him as one who 
ought at once to become active in Christian service and 
manifest the graces of a mature Christian? If he 
“falls from grace” are we not prone to condemn? Do 
we treat him as we would treat the toddler in the home 
who, just learning to walk, falls and hurts himself? 
I>o we think of him as a child? Yet that is just what 
he is with respect to the Christian life, and it is 
ridiculous to act on the assumption that a child should 
manifest the strength and stability, the wisdom and 
culture of a mature man. We sorely need to meditate 
upon Paul’s admonition to the Galatians: “Brethren, 
if a man be overtaken in any trespass, ye who are 
spiritual, restore such a one in the spirit of meekness, 
looking to thyself, lest thou also be tempted.” Doubt¬ 
less there are hypocrites in the churches, but it is 
inexcusable to jump to the conclusion that all od 
most of the inconsistent and inactive church mem¬ 
bers are hypocrites. The chances are that they are 
Christian at heart, but they are so young or so un¬ 
developed that they manifest little of Christian vigor 
and frequently fall by the way. What such persons 
need above everything else is the counsel and help 
of those who are older in the faith. More church 
members would be better Christians if all of us could 


24 


What Is a Christian? 


see more clearly the truth that the primary business 
of the church is the development of that spiritual 
life which is the gift of God, so that it may manifest 
itself in Christ-like service. 


IV. The Christian Versus the Moralist. 


Probably no more perplexing problem is presented 
to the young Christian than when, perhaps :while en¬ 
gaged in the effort to persuade some one else to start 
the Christian life, he is confronted by an argument 
like this: “I don’t see why I should be a Christian. 
There’s Mr. A. He’s not a Christian, yet everybody 
says he’s one of the best men in town—a good deal bet¬ 
ter than many of your Christians. He wouldn’t do the 
mean things that some of these church people do.” 

Now, the chances are in every such case that when 
the objector says “Christian’’ he means “church mem¬ 
ber.” It is a fact that Mr. 'A. is not a church mem¬ 
ber; but it is by no means so certain that he is not a 
Christian. Indeed, the writer has known several such 
persons as Mr. A. and in nearly every case it was found 
that the person who was held up as a moral exemplar 
was really a sincere Christian man, though for some 
reason failing in the plain duty to make a public 
affirmation of his allegiance. Often such persons have 
such an exalted notion of the meaning of church mem¬ 
bership that they feel themselves wholly unworthy to 
belong to an organization of Christians, and often 
they have such a dread of falling short of any profes¬ 
sion they might make that they prefer to make no pro¬ 
fession at all, but they are Christians nevertheless. 

However, it is true that there are men—there have 
— 25 — 


26 


What Is a Christian? 


been such men in all ages—who are of high moral char¬ 
acter and live as shining examples among their fellows, 
and yet deny the Christian purpose. Few if any such 
have anything but the highest admiration, even rever¬ 
ence, for Jesus of Nazareth, yet they would not go so 
far as to say that the ruling purpose of their lives is 
to become like him—though perhaps it is, after all. 
These are our “moralists.” They have a high sense 
of honor and of duty, a keen perception of what is 
generally agreed to be right and honorable, and it is 
their pride so to live in conformity to prevailing moral 
standards that no man can say they have fallen short 
of these standards. Their god, so to speak, is the 
moral standard of the community in which they live; 
their ruling purpose is to live in conformity to that 
standard. 

In all candor we should go a step farther. It is 
very commonly a fact that, judged by these moral 
standards, such a “moralist” actually is a better man, 
a more nearly perfect man, than the average professed 
Christian of his town. Usually it is not difficult to 
find a reason for this. In most cases this highly moral 
man had a much better start than the average Chris¬ 
tian as fudged by the moral scale. In most cases, too, 
the moralist is a mature man, well established in his 
mode of life, while the average Christian is much 
younger in years and experience. Besides, the ex¬ 
ceptional moral man usually enjoyed the advantages 
of a peculiarly helpful moral environment, while the 
average Christian grew up in just an average environ* 


Christian and Church Member 


27 


merit. Such things are all worthy of consideration, yet 
they do not hint at the radical difference between the 
mere moralist and the true Christian. Here is that 
difference: 

The moralist is a man who has “arrived”—arrived 
at the goal of a human standard. The Christian is 
one (who is merely on the way, but he is on the way 
toward a divine ideal. The purpose of the mere moral¬ 
ist is to live out his life on the plane of his achieve¬ 
ment, but the purpose of the Christian is not merely to 
attain to and live by a human standard but to lift that 
standard higher and higher by “reaching forth” toward 
the full-grown man, “the measure of the stature of 
the fulness of Christ.” This is not to accuse the moral 
man of lacking altogether the same high purpose for, 
as already intimated, it is not improbable that he is 
really actuated by a purpose he does not recognize, but 
taking him at his word, the difference between the 
mere moralist and, the true Christian is that the form¬ 
er is content with his attainments while the latter 
can never be content with anything less than likeness 
to Jesus Christ, who is the shining forth of God’s glory 
and “the express image of his person.” 

What we commonly fail to see is that our mere mor¬ 
alist is but a creature of his environment, and environ¬ 
ment varies greatly. The consequence is that one who 
may be accounted a veritable moral paragon in the 
town where he now lives would be looked upon as a 
social outcast if he should move into one of our finest 
Christian communities. Tn Turkey, even in Utah, one 


28 


What Is a Christian? 


may foe a polygamist and yet be considered a highly 
moral man. Indeed, there are parts of the world where 
the murderer of children may still move in the “best 
society.” In short, moral standards differ in differ* 
ent parts of the earth. They have also been changing 
steadily as the years have passed, and always for the 
better. Lewdness once openly encouraged in royal 
courts is today scarcely tolerated in our vilest slums. 
Drunkenness—why the first record of Presbyterian of¬ 
ficial church action against intemperance of which we 
have any knowledge was a timid resolution admonish¬ 
ing Presbyterian ministers not “to drink too much on 
public occasions” Clearly a minister of that day— 
only about 125 years ago—could have lived up to that 
standard most faithfully and yet he would have been 
far down the scale as measured by the standard of to¬ 
day with respect to temperance. Is it clear what such 
an illustration means? It means that if we were to 
judge the Christianity of the ministers of that day by 
the moral standard of today we would have to conclude 
that they were not Christians at all. Yet proof that 
most of them were Christians is found in the fact that 
they were not content with the moral standard of their 
times but, prompted by the purpose to attain to a 
divine ideal, their vision became clearer and clearer 
and they and their successors in the Christian minis¬ 
try took step after step toward abstinence and pro¬ 
hibition until today drunkenness is rarely seen and 
the whole traffic in intoxicants is under the ban. 

Surely it is most unwise, if not essentially unjust 


Christian and Church Member 


21) 


and uuChristlike, to condemn the moral man and bis 
morality in the manner that even some Christian 
ministers have been known to do. So far as he goes, 
the moral man is clearly worthy of commendation, but 
also of commiseration, for he is missing something 
and does not know it. He is a man who has fallen into 
“the peril of the lesser good.” Go read algain the story 
of the rich young ruler to discover the Christ attitude 
toward the moral man and also the contrast between 
the mere moralist and the Christian. That rich young 
man was in every way attractive. He had kept the law. 
He lived a moral life. He met every requirement of the 
moral standard of his time and community, yet he was 
conscious of a disturbing lack. He was a lovable fel¬ 
low, and looking on him, Jesus loved him. Nor did 
Jesus condemn the young man’s life. Rather, his 
words imply approval; but Jesus saw that, in his 
devotion to things that were good, the young ruler was 
missing the best, so he said: “If thou wouldst be 
perfect” let everything else go “and come, follow me.” 
The sad thing about the story is that the young man’s 
love of riches kept him from making the Christian pur¬ 
pose the ruling purpose of his life. Now, as then, a 
man may be reckoned by “good society” as a perfectly 
moral man though, having great possessions of what¬ 
ever kind, he uses his wealth for himself alone, and 
this is just the opposite of the Christian spirit, which 
counts all that one is and has as a trust subject to the 
will of the heavenly Father. 

To be a Christian, then, is not the same as to live 


30 


What Is a Christian? 


in conformity to the moral standards of any place or 
time, though, of course, the true Christian spirit always 
prompts towards the purest morality, as the term 
“morality” is understood in the time and place where 
one lives. It is impossible to say that one is a Chris¬ 
tian because he lives as a moral man. It is equally im¬ 
possible to determine that he is not a Christian be¬ 
cause he does not conform in all respects to what we 
consider the proper moral standard. The Christian 
may or may not have attained to what we consider the 
true moral standard, but this much is certain about 
him: He knows that he has not attained to what is 
for him the Ideal of spirit and conduct, but down in 
his heart is this ruling purpose: “I press on, if so be 
that I may lay hold on that for which also I was laid 
hold on by Christ Jesus.” 


V. The Christian Versus the Not Christian. 

When stripped of all familiar theological and reli¬ 
gious terminology, the really fundamental difference 
between the Christian and the man who is not a Chris¬ 
tian may be made clear by the following simple pro¬ 
position : 

The dominating purpose of the Christian is to do 
God's will. 

The dominating purpose of the Not Christian is to 
do as he pleases. 

Recall the fact that in this study we are not at¬ 
tempting to decide how some men, come to have one 
dominating purpose and some another. Our single 
aim is to make clear, in untheological terms, the funda¬ 
mental difference between the Christian and the Not 
Christian; and this difference will be found to be at 
heart a difference of will—a self-centered will versus 
a surrendered will. Putting the difference in other 
words: 

The Christian wills to do God’s will. 

The Not Christian wills to do his own will. 

To make such statements is not to imply that the 
person who is not a Christian necessarily leads a life 
of great sinfulness. He may not. Indeed, it would 
seem to be theoretically possible for a man, under this 
analysis, to be classified as a Not Christian and yet to 
live a life in harmony with the will of God. That is, 

— 81 — 


32 


Wiiat Is a Christian? 


it might happen that a man's own purpose accords per¬ 
fectly with God’s will and yet that man continues 
to occupy the attitude of total disregard of the will 
of God. The true Christian, on the other hand, though 
he may fall far short of the ideal, is one who sincerely 
subordinates his own will to the will of God, so far as 
the divine will is known and understood. 

The objection may be raised that the Not Christian 
does not really do his own will: that he is, though un¬ 
consciously, the slave of other spiritual forces which 
strive against the will of God; and this may be true. 
Man is very proud of saying, “I am my own master,” 
but it is very doubtful whether he ever really is his 
own master. “Know ye not”, says Paul, “that to whom 
ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye 
are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or 
of obedience unto righteousness?” It is not at all im¬ 
possible that the man who boasts of following the bent 
of his own will is really a slave of the “Zeitgeist”, the 
spirit and temper of his times and associates; yet, 
whether he is fooling himself or not, the fact remains 
that he thinks he is doing as he pleases and that he 
means to do his own will and not the will of anyone 
else on earth or in heaven. It is this which distin¬ 
guishes him from the Christian for, however often he 
may fail, the Christian really means to do the will of 
God. It is easy to see that between these two there is 
a radical difference of spirit and purpose. 

Once more the reader needs to be cautioned to re¬ 
member that we are considering only the “ruling pur- 


Christian Versus Not Christian 


33 


pose” of life. It is not meant to affirm that the Chris¬ 
tian actually does the will of God throughout his life, 
that all of his actions, decisions and undertakings are 
the result of divine control. Indeed, at this point the 
Christian faces a very grave danger of self-deception. 
It is as easy for him to fool himself as for the man 
who prides himself upon his absolute independence of 
will, and when a Christian is thus self-deceived he be¬ 
comes w r hat we call a fanatic. Thinking that he is 
God-guided and spirit-prompted, he does all sorts of 
things which are obviously out of accord with the will 
of God as that will is revealed in Scripture and in the 
life of Christ. But the true Christian rarely makes 
this mistake. He is ever aware of the fact that he falls 
far short of God’s righteous and holy will. Neverthe¬ 
less his ruling purpose is that his whole life shall be 
God-controlled, and with this desire upper-most he 
looks up into the face of his Heavenly Father and says, 
“I surrender all. Take me. teach me, guide me, streng¬ 
then me, that I may walk in the footsteps of Him who 
said at the beginning of his life, T came to do Thy will,’ 
and at its close ‘Not my will but Thine be done.’ ” 

It is as we think of Jesus Christ that it becomes 
apparent that necessarily the Christian is one who 
puts himself under divine control and seeks to know 
and do God’s will. The Christian’s ultimate goal is to 
become like Christ and what made the Man of Galilee 
absolutely unique among all who ever trod the earth 
was that, at every turn of the way, at every crisis of 
life, however severe the temptation and however great 


34 What Is a Christian? 

the struggle, he emerged victorious and actually did 
what he himself said he came from heaven to do—‘‘the 
will of my Father which is in heaven.” In Jesus was 
God’s character, God’s will, God’s way manifested 
unto men. It must be, therefore, that it is by the kind 
of life he lived, a life surrendered to the will of the 
Father, that we both learn that divine will and receive 
the power to live in ever-increasing harmony with the 
will of God. In the early days, as indicated in the New 
Testament, Christianity was described in simple terms 
as “the Way,” a term that suggests at once a life of 
progress toward a definite goal. That’s just what it 
is—“the Jesus Way”, as it is described to this day by 
some of the natives of India. It is the way toward the 
goal which Jesus set—“that they also may be one in 
us”—and the life attitude essential to walking the 
way and gaining the goal is that of surrender to the 
will of God. Hence the difference between the Chris¬ 
tian and the Not Christian may be thus stated: 

The Not Christian walls to go his owm w r av. 

The Christian wills to go the Jesus way. 


VI. Not Full-grown but Growing. 

One invariable characteristic of the Christian is 
immaturity. 

All Christians have actually begun to live a new 
life, a life which is evidenced by the consciousness of 
new purpose, by a sense of obligation to a divine Fath¬ 
er, as the physical life is evidenced by breath and 
heart-beat. Like the children in a large family, how¬ 
ever, Christians differ greatly among themselves. Some 
are younger, weaker, less perfectly developed than oth¬ 
ers. Yet, while differing greatly, all have this in com¬ 
mon : They are still immature; they have not yet at¬ 
tained. 

We are accustomed to make a rather sharp dis¬ 
tinction by classifying human beings as either children 
or men; but as a matter of fact does a human being 
ever reach maturity in this life except with respect to 
physical development? We become men in physical 
stature, but how like children most of us remain in all 
other respects. And when, after years, the most high¬ 
ly developed seem about to outgrow their childhood, 
they start backward again because of the influence of 
a worn out body. We must always make allowances 
for the inherent childishness of the race. In like man¬ 
ner, in any study of the Christian we must make al¬ 
lowance for his persistent immaturity. We are sure 
to misunderstand, sure to misjudge, unless we keep 
—35— 


36 


What Is a Christian? 


ever in mind the truth that the Christian, young or 
old, weak or strong, is still but a child, undergoing a 
process of development. 

No thought is set forth more clearly and none is 
more emphasized in Scripture than the thought that 
the Christian is a child and that he is expected to grow. 
Paul wrote to the Corinthians as to “babes in Christ/’ 
babes who were still unable to assimilate more sub¬ 
stantial food than milk, and he taught the Ephesians 
that the purpose of the whole organization of the 
church—apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teach¬ 
ers—was that “we may no longer be children. . . . 
but . . . grow up in all things into him who is 

the head, even Christ.” Everywhere this truth stands 
out in the Bible and it is set forth in the familiar doc¬ 
trine of the churches known as “growth in grace.” 
Hence, as we try to determine just what a Christian is, 
we may be sure that our concern is not with “a fixed 
object,” so to speak, but with a moving object; not 
with a person whose character is settled and no longer 
subject to change, but with a person who is constantly 
changing because steadily developing toward the ideal 
life. It may be truly said that the Christian is the 
subject of an evolutionary process, and where there 
is no such process of change and growth there is no 
Christian. There is no such thing as a static Christian. 

While growth is the law of Christian living, every 
Christian begins as a “babe in Christ.” This is the 
practical meaning of a church doctrine which is often 
thought of as unusually mystical and mysterious— 


Not Full-grown but Growing 


37 


the doctrine of “regeneration.” Sometimes young 
Christians are sore distressed because of inability to 
answer the question which they are constantly asking 
themselves: “Have I really been regenerated ?” Well, 
have you reason to believe that you are living? Then 
you certainly were born. Regeneration means simply 
rebirth, a new birth, a birth from above; that is, the 
beginning of a spiritual life. For practical purposes 
it matters little when or how or under what conditions 
that life had its beginning; the practical question is, 
Are we living? It is possible that one becomes consci¬ 
ous of the new life at the very moment of its beginning. 
Another may have been living some time before being 
conscious of the fact, just as the human infant prob¬ 
ably lives for months before being self-conscious. But 
however early or late one becomes conscious of the 
Christian spirit and purpose dominating his life, he 
certainly begins that new life as an infant; he does 
not leap into it full grown and fully equipped for its 
adventures and its struggles. Let us get this truth 
clearly: One may be a Christian though as weak and 
helpless as a new born babe. 

Not only does each Christian begin as a babe, but 
all growth is slow, and the higher the form of life the 
longer drawn out are the processes of development. 
The toadstool may spring to maturity in a night, but 
it is days before the kitten so much as gets its eyes 
open, months before a baby can walk, years before the 
child reaches the stature and strength of manhood, 
decades before the mental powers are so developed 


38 


What Is a Christian? 


that Ave can speak of the man as a person of mature 
judgment. It is to be expected, therefore, that the 
development of character and spirit toward likeness 
to the divine ideal Avill be, like all other evolutionary 
processes, slow, gradual, perhaps imperceptible, ex¬ 
cept as viewed after long intervals of time. It is by no 
sudden leap that the Christian comes into possession 
of spiritual strength and equipment; it is by the sIoav 
process of growth. Young Christians are sometimes 
led to expect that upon starting the Christian life they 
Avill at once be clothed with almost irresistible spirit¬ 
ual power, but, normally at least, this does not occur, 
and all of us should attend to the warning: “Let him 
that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.” 


“We have not wings, Ave cannot soar; 

But Ave have feet to scale and climb 
By slow degrees, by more and more, 

The cloudy summits of our time. 

“The heights by great men reached and kept 
Were not attained by sudden flight, 

But they, while their companions slept, 
Were toiling upward through the night.” 


There is a third truth with respect to Christian de- 
velopment Avhich is of importance. It is that growth 
is influenced greatly by environment. Just as soil and 
climate, sunshine and moisture, affect the growth of a 
plant, so what Ave call the spiritual surroundings af- 


Not Full-Grown but Growing 


39 


feet the development of a Christian. Of course, it is 
incumbent upon the Christian to seek the best possible 
environment—that is the reason why he should join 
the church, associate with more mature Christians, 
cultivate the habits of prayer and Bible study and 
give expression to the life that is in him by sacrific¬ 
ing service. But it should not be forgotten that his 
environment is not wholly within his control. Some 
have tremendous advantages of which others are wholly 
deprived. One, for instance, began the Christian life 
in infancy and grew up in the finest type of Christian 
home and the truest kind of Christian church; but an¬ 
other did not become a Christian until much later in 
life, after having been for years the slave of selfish, 
“carnal,” habits, and has been forced to live ever since 
where church privileges were limited and in the midst 
of associates whose influence is altogether against 
Christian development. All such circumstances should 
be taken into consideration as we seek to answer our 
question, What is a Christian? 


VII. Not a Graduate but a Pupil. 


The Christian is a disciple of Christ. 

To translate that term “disciple” into more familiar 
language, it means that the Christian is one who has 
enrolled or matriculated in the school of Christ. He 
has taken his place as a learner, a pupil. 

There comes a time in human life when the child 
leaves the grade school and enters high school. Later, 
perhaps, he matriculates in college. From these suc¬ 
cessive educational institutions he graduates in due 
season. But no one ever graduates from the great 
school of life, unless, indeed, that day of death which 
we are taught to face with such dread is but a wonder¬ 
ful graduation day, when we take our diplomas, break 
the ties of school-days and launch out upon the larger 
life which lies beyond the limitations of time and sense. 

Now, just as we remain throughout our three score 
years and ten as pupils in the school of life, so the 
time never comes to the Christian in the flesh when he 
graduates from the school of Christ. He advances. 
He passes from class to class. He gains in knowledge 
of spiritual things. His conception of Christian truth 
and Christian character becomes clearer. But he re¬ 
mains a pupil—a learner. To be a disciple—a learner 
—is a Christian characteristic. Where it does not 
exist, the reality of the Christian life may well be 
questioned. 


—40— 


Not a Graduate but a Pupil 


41 


While no Christian is a graduate and every Chris¬ 
tian is a pupil, it is not surprising to find that the 
pupils are of many different grades. Indeed, while we 
may separate them in “grades”, a careful test would 
doubtless reveal the fact that no two are exactly alike 
or of exactly the same standing in the school. They 
vary all the way from those who might be assigned to 
the “Cradle Roll” to those who may be accounted as 
“postgraduates”, and, of course, they differ greatly 
with respect to capacity and aptitude. There are 
some very bright pupils. But there are also some very 
dull pupils, like those referred to in the fifth chapter 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews, who, at a time when 
they ought to have been teachers, were so backward 
that they needed someone to teach them “the rudiments 
of the first principles” and concerning whom the writer 
intimates that they were unable “to discern good and 
evil.’’ Such pupils are far down the scale, hardly fit 
for admittance to the Kindergarten. Yet they are as 
truly “disciples” as any others. It would be cruel and 
foolish to exclude them from the school just because 
they have yet so much to learn. 

It is just here that persons who are not Christians 
and even many who are active in the church and ought 
to know better make a serious blunder. They talk 
and act as if one could not be a Christian at all un¬ 
less lie had progressed far enough to have mastered, 
or at least studied, certain parts of the Christian 
curriculum. Just what the “required subjects” are 
depends on who fixes the requirement. Sometimes 


42 


What Is a Christian? 


much is required by^a church, sometimes but little. 
The truth is, however, that a person may be one of 
Christ's “little ones," may be in fact a Christian 'dis¬ 
ciple, even though he has not yet learned the most 
elemental Christian truths, just as an infant may be 
really alive even though he gives no sign of knowing 
anything. Of course, the person who is born and 
reared in a Christian land is sure to have some under¬ 
standing of Christian character and Christian duty 
by the time he is able to understand anything at all; 
but, though it probably never happened, it seems al¬ 
together possible that a person in some pagan land 
might sincerely accept Christ, be born from above, 
start as a real Christian disciple, without having the 
slightest knowledge of the simplest requirement of 
Christian ethics. 

A story has been told which illustrates the state¬ 
ment just made. The accuracy of the tale cannot be 
vouched for, but it is well known that missionaries in 
certain lands find it necessary to give their con¬ 
verts months of training before it is wise to admit 
them to the church, and something like this may 
have happened: It is said that somewhere in the 
South Sea Islands a great religious revival was in 
progress and natives from distant points attended the 
services. One night a number of these visitors pro¬ 
fessed to become Christians, greatly to the joy of the 
missionaries. The next morning the missionaries were 
surprised to find that nearly all of their cooking uten¬ 
sils had disappeared and investigation revealed the 


Not a Graduate but a Pupil 


43 


fact that the new converts had taken the pots and pans 
and departed for their own habitations! Hypocrites, 
you say? But wait a moment. They were followed 
and found. It was explained to them that it was 
wrong and unchristian to take the possessions of an¬ 
other; but this had not occurred to them, their desire 
being merely to exhibit the novel implements to their 
friends “back home.” When convinced that they had 
done wrong, they cheerfully returned the goods, which 
action was rather conclusive proof that they were 
Christians, even though they had never been taught 
to distinguish between mine and thine. 

When Jesus told his early followers to go into all 
the world and make disciples he made it very plain 
that he did not expect such new disciples to know all 
about Christian duties and Christian graces. To the 
“Go make disciples’’ he added, “teaching them, to ob¬ 
serve all things whatsoever I commanded you.” The 
church of today is untrue to the terms of the Great 
Commission if it acts, as it often does, as if a dull 
and untaught pupil were not a disciple at all. Of 
course, a Christian should do his utmost to learn and 
“leaving the first principles of Christ, press on unto 
perfection,” yet the test /of a Christian is not that 
he is highly cultivated with respect to Christian truth 
but that he acts up to the knowledge that he has and 
does the thing which he believes Christ would do under 
the same conditions. 


VIII. Not a Conqueror but a Combatant. 

The Christian life is not a state of tranquility but 
of war. Its symbol is not an olive branch but a 
sword. To enter the Christian life is pot to drop 
anchor in a calm haven but to enlist in an army. 

A vigorous protest should be sounded against a 
type of professedly Christian teaching which makes 
the acceptance of Christ almost the equivalent of tak¬ 
ing a pleasant opiate and which would have the church 
(like many a church edifice) more closely related to 
a graveyard than to any other institution. Young 
persons are taught that to become a Christian is to 
lose all burdens and responsibilities, to enter into an 
unbroken experience of soul-rest, to “sit together in 
heavenly places” and complacently contemplate a race 
sinking to eternal destruction, to supinely await a 
coming cataclysm when dawdling inaction shall re¬ 
ceive the stamp of divine approval. 

How diametrically opposed is such teaching to a 
challenge like that of Paul: “Put on the whole armor 
of God.” Why? Because the Christian life means con¬ 
flict, struggle, and “our wrestling is not against flesh 
and blood, but against the principalities, against the 
powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness’* or, 
as translated more clearly by Moffatt, against “the 
potentates of the dark present, the spiritual forces 
of evil in the spiritual sphere.” No soldier in anv of 
— 44 — 


Not Conqueror but Combatant 45 

the world’s great armies ever marched forth to such 
hot conflict or against such terrible foes as must be 
faced by the Christian. No wonder then that Paul 
urges (Moffatt’s translation) : “So take God’s armor, 
that you may be able to make a stand upon the evil 
day and hold your ground by overcoming all the foe. 
Hold your ground, tighten the belt of truth about 
your loins, wear integrity as your coat of mail, and 
have your feet shod with the stability of the gospel 
of peace; above all, take faith as your shield, to enable 
you to quench all the fire-tipped darts flung by the 
evil one, put on salvation as your helmet, and take the 
Spirit as your sword, (that is, the Word of God).” 

Nor is there the slightest basis for the placid, 
flabby, “mollycoddle” type of pseudo-Christianity in 
the teaching of Jesus. He calls for action, not indo¬ 
lence. He foresaw the most stubborn opposition to the 
development of the Christian life—opposition both 
within and without the individual Christian. “Think 
not that I came to send peace on the earth,” he said, “I 
came not to send peace, but a sword.” Later, as he 
was about to be crucified, he told his disciples that 
whereas he once sent them forth without even purses, 
being sure of the hospitality of the people, now they 
should be ready to sell a cloak, if necessary, in order 
to buy a sword, because they would have to contend 
with violent opposition. Of course, Jesus was not 
using the words literally. Just a few hours later he 
condemned the use of a sword of steel in the hands 
of Peter. But the whole meaning of his teaching was 


40 


What Is a Christian? 


that the Christian would have to make his way against 
intense opposition of a spiritual kind. Just what he 
meant is revealed in such words as these: “A man’s 
foes shall be those of his own household. He that 
loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy 
of me.” How hard it is to pursue consistently the 
Christian way when all of one’s friends, even his kins¬ 
men, oppose the course that Christ commands! It is 
just that kind of a spiritual conflict that ever con¬ 
fronts the Christian. 

“He that overcometh!” That is what a Christian 
is. But he cannot be an overcomer unless he is a 
combatant. He must overcome the opposition with¬ 
out. He must also overcome the opposition within— 
must overcome himself, and the hardest battles he 
ever fights are the battles with himself. And he’s 
still fighting! 

Oh, yes, the Christian has won some victories, 
glorious victories. Perhaps he scarcely realized the 
truth at the time. He was not sure whether he was 
victor or vanquished, so hard-fought was the battle, 
so uncertain the outcome. But as he looks back over 
the past of his Christian life he realizes that he was 
not always defeated but was often more than a con¬ 
queror through Christ who loves him. Yet there is no 
danger that the true Christian will ever weep like 
Alexander because there are no more worlds to con¬ 
quer, for he learns that the battle breaks out afresh 
with every new day. He may one day be able to sing 
paeans of triumph on “the plains of peace,” but while 


Not Conqueror but Combatant 


47 


life lasts he needs most of his lnng power for the 
battle-cry. 

There are plenty of foes without, but it is the foes 
within who never show a flag of truce and who are 
the most redoubtable antagonists. This is to be ex¬ 
pected, for the moment the Christian life begins there 
starts a conflict between the “new man” and the “old 
Adam,” between “the natural man” and “the spiritual 
man.” Immediately there come into operation two 
great law r s, the law of “growth” and the law of “mor¬ 
tification^—strange but wonderfully expressive word 
used in the New Testament. “Mortify your members 
which are upon the earth,” says Paul. What does 
he mean? Why, to mortify is to put to death, to 
cause to die, and when one becomes a Christian, when 
he has the ruling purpose to become Christlike, then, 
of course, he will undertake just what Paul en¬ 
joins in that third chapter of Colossians: He will (1) 
“aim at what is above” and (2) strive to “put to death 
those members that are on earth: sexual vice, impu¬ 
rity, appetite, evil desire, etc.” But, as we have seen, 
development in the higher life is a slow process and the 
old “members” are persistent and do not want to be 
put to death, and the consequence is daily, hourly con¬ 
flict between the old life and the new. The Christian 
needs ever to pray: 

“Since I must fight if I would win, 

Increase my courage, Lord.” 


48 


What Is a Christian? 


“He that overcometh!” Did you ever read through 
at one sitting those seven messages to the seven 
churches of Asia as recorded in the second and third 
chapters of the Revelation? Read them some day. 
You will discover that two things are common to all 
seven epistles. One is the simple, cheering truth of 
the familiar hymn, “Jesus knows all about our trou 
bles”—knows where we dwell, our trials, our problems, 
our sore temptations. The other is that every promise 
made is “to him that overcometh.’’ The hidden manna, 
the white stone, the new name, the white garments, 
even “authority over the nations” are all for “him 
that overcometh.” And then, at the end of the sev¬ 
enth letter, it is all summed up in these wonderful 
words: “He that overcometh, I will give to him to 
sit down with me in my throne, as I also overcame 
and sat down with my Father in his throne.” Yes, 
the purpose to be conformed to Jesus Christ means 
the purpose to “fight the good fight of faith” and be 
ever ready to “suffer hardship—as a good soldier of 
Jesus Christ,” knowing that ultimate victory is certain 
and that a crown of rejoicing awaits the victor. 


IX. Not a Saint but a Sinner. 


In writing an account of evangelistic meetings for 
publication in a church paper, a minister reported 
that there were very large congregations every night 
but added, “there were very few sinners present at 
any of the services.” Unfortunately that habit of 
designating as “sinners” only those persons who are 
not professing Christians is altogether too common. 
Perhaps it is due to this use of the word that men 
outside of the church sneeringly refer to all church 
members as “saints,” apparently ibelieving that to 
profess to be a Christian is equivalent to claiming to 
be exceptionally holy. As comparatively few Chris* 
tians give any indication of the halo of sanctity, the 
misunderstanding leads to disrespect. 

The term “saint” was used in New Testament 
times to designate all Christians, not as exceptionally 
holy persons, but as persons set apart from others by 
virtue of the fact that they sought to become holy; 
not as perfect people but as people who were aiming 
at and striving after perfection. It is clear that this 
is Paul’s meaning when he uses the word. He tells us 
that one of the objects in view in the calling of va¬ 
rious kinds of Christian workers—evangelists, pas¬ 
tors and teachers—is “the perfecting of the saints,” 
who would certainly need no perfecting if they were 
already perfect. Indeed, it is apparent that many of 
— 49 — 


50 


What Is a Christian? 


the “saints” to whom Paul wrote his epistles were 
very far from perfect. He finds it necessary to urge 
upon the “saints” of Ephesus that they must not lie 
or steal or indulge in gross immorality; he charges 
the “saints” at Corinth with being still “carnal”; he 
exhorts the “saints” at Philippi to do nothing through 
faction or vainglory but cultivate the mind of Christ 
and think on the things that are true and honorable 
and just and lovely, and the “saints” at Colossae to 
“put to death .... fornication, uncleanness, pas¬ 
sion, evil desire and covetousness, which is idolatry’’ 
and also to put away “anger, wrath, malice, railing, 
shameful speaking out of your mouth .... seeing 
that ye have put off the old man with his doings, and 
have put on the new man, that is being renewed unto 
knowledge after the image of him that created him.” 
Clearly, Paul’s “saints” were very much the same 
kind o& common folk to be found in the churches of 
today. The Christians of then and now were and are 
the men and women who are seeking to overcome the 
“old man” and perfect the “new man.” 

It is only in a comparative sense that we are jus¬ 
tified in speaking of some exceptional Christian char¬ 
acters as “saints.” In the absolute sense there are 
no saints, and there never were any. We like to honor 
the name of the great apostle to the Gentiles by giving 
him the title of Saint Paul, but Paul himself repu¬ 
diated all claims to saintliness. We talk and write 
about “Saint Peter,” and if tradition is to be trusted 
lie died so nobly the death of a martyr that the title 


Not Saint but Sinner 


51 


is worthily bestowed; yet it was this same disciple 
who denied his Lord with curses and who must have 
been through most of the Master’s days on earth a 
sore trial to his fellows. Even John, probably the 
gentlest and saintliest of all the disciples, subjected 
himself to the Master’s sharp rebuke because, with 
James, his temper got the better of him and he was 
ready to call down fire from heaven to destroy some 
villagers who failed in hospitality. And all of the 
“saints” since manufactured in ecclesiastical mills 
were, after all, but poor sinners, saved by grace. 

True, there have been and are deluded Christians 
who consider themselves perfect—and are apt to be¬ 
come very angry if their claim is questioned. But 
the claim itself is sufficient proof of their shortcom¬ 
ing, for not even a near-saint will be found boasting 
of his saintliness. Rather, he will be heard saying, 
“God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of 
our Lord Jesus Christ/’ Indeed, the more progress 
one makes toward holiness, the more likely he is to 
be keenly conscious of the exceeding sinfulness of sin. 
This truth is rather strikingly set forth in Paul’s life 
and letters. Tn one of his earlier epistles, that to the 
Galatians, Paul manifests a strong tendency to em¬ 
phasize the fact that he was no ordinary man but an 
apostle of such standing and independence that his 
teachings should be most humbly accepted and fol¬ 
lowed. A little later, in the first epistle to the Cor¬ 
inthians, he speaks of himself as “the least of the 
apostles, that am not meet to be called an apostle.” 


52 


What Is a Christian? 


Still later, in Ephesians, Paul represents himself as 
“less than the least of all saints” and when near the 
end of his life, in First Timothy, he writes about “sin¬ 
ners, of whom T am chief” Was Paul less of a Chris¬ 
tian as he neared the end of his remarkable life of 
devoted service? Surely not, but he was more con¬ 
scious of sin in his members and more humble and 
dependent on God. 

The difference between the Christian and the Not 
Christian is not that the former is a saint and the 
latter a sinner. Both are sinners. True, as Dr. 
Washington Gladden once said, “The deliberate and 
habitual practise of any form of dishonesty or im¬ 
morality is impossible to one who follows Christ/’ 
and therefore the church is justified in rejecting such 
a person from its membership, whatever his profession. 
Nevertheless, Christians are sinners and daily find 
occasion to lift their faces to the heavenly Father with 
confession and repentance. The difference between the 
two kinds of sinners may be thus expressed: 

The Not Christian is a sinner who cherishes and 
takes pleasure in sin; 

The Christian is a sinner whose attitude toward 
sin is that of constant opposition and growing hatred. 

The Not Christian, for instance, is often one who 
takes pride in tyrannical bearing and violent temper 
and so develops the very qualities which ought to be 
uprooted; but the Christian is quickly ashamed of 
his outbursts of temper and assiduously cultivates con¬ 
siderateness and self-control. The one sinks deeper 


Not Saint but Sinner 


53 


into the mire of sin; the other little by little, gets 
his feet on firmer ground. The one becomes more and 
more a victim; the other more and more a victor. 
To sin deliberately and persistently is to walk in 
darkness, and if any who so walk in darkness say that 
they have fellowship with God they ‘die and do not 
the truth.” Yet “if we say that we have no sin, we 
deceive ourselves and do not the truth.” The Christian 
is still a sinner and conscious of his sinfulness; but 
he also has the joy of knowing that “if we confess our 
sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our 
sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 


X. Xot Saved but Being Saved. 

Is the assertion ot the title startling? Well, like 
most epigramatic sentences or phrases, it does not 
express the whole truth. At the same time, it comes 
much nearer to the whole truth than to speak of Chris¬ 
tians in the popular manner as being persons who are 
“saved.” 

Maids salvation must always be thought of in 
three tenses—perfect, imperfect, and future-perfect. 
The glorious truth is always incomplete when we think 
of it in one tense only. Tn one limited sense the 
Christian is now “saved/’ In a much more vital sense 
he is “being saved.” He shall have been saved only 
when, in the fulness of time, “God hath made the pile 
complete.” “By grace ye are saved;” “now is our 
salvation nearer than when we believed;” “he that 
endureth unto the end shall be saved.” 

As used in the Bible, the various parts of the word 
“save’’ have three distinct meanings. The word is 
used frequently in the sense of accomplished deliver¬ 
ance, especially deliverance from peril or enemies. In- 
deed r in parts of the Old Testament the word trans¬ 
lated “deliver” is the same word commonly translated 
“save”. A second meaning of the word is “to make 
sound” or “to make whole.” In this sense the word 
always carries the idea of incompleteness and it re¬ 
lates to an inward rather than an outward deliverance. 

— 54 — 


Not Saved but Being Saved 


55 


And this, by the way, is the sense in which the word 
is almost invariably used in the New Testament. The 
third meaning (found mainly in the Old Testament) 
is to give ease—surcease from trouble, freedom from 
conflict, rest and refuge. It is in substantially these 
three senses that we must think of the word as ap¬ 
plied to the Christian. 

With respect to the past, the Christian is saved — 
from what for the Not Christian is the sure and inev¬ 
itable penalty or consequence of sin. It is this fact 
which is the basis of the great doctrine of “justifica¬ 
tion.” “The wages of sin is death”—spiritual death. 
It would be beyond the scope of this discussion to enter 
into a consideration of what sin is from the theo¬ 
logical point of view or of how, through God’s unde¬ 
served favor, because of his nature of love, man is 
“justified;” but, from the point of view of life, sin 
is that which causes a man to fall short of that higher 
life for which he was designed. Hence, the natural 
result of sin is death —missing the higher life. The 
consequence of that failure to enter into and enjoy the 
higher life is so certain that Scripture speaks of the 
Not Christian as one who is already “dead in tres¬ 
passes and sins” as one “condemned already.” But 
the Christian is one who has been “quickened” or 
made alive spiritually, and therefore he is “saved” 
from spiritual death. This is an accomplished fact. 
He that hath the son, hath life ”—eternal life, which 
is not a promised gift but a present possession. He 


56 


What Is a Christian? 


“hath everlasting life, and shall not come into con¬ 
demnation; but is passed from death unto life.” 

With respect to the present, the Christian is “be¬ 
ing saved.” Salvation is a process going on within, 
the development of the life which the Christian has. 
Though already delivered from sin’s inevitable conse¬ 
quences; the Christian is not yet delivered from his 
lower self, from the power of sin over his own life; 
he is not yet sound and whole. Hence, he is admon¬ 
ished to “work out your own salvation with fear and 
trembling.” The truth contained in the preceding par¬ 
agraph and in this one is strikingly set forth in the 
fifth chapter of Paul’s epistle to the Romans and is 
summed up in these words of the tenth verse: “If, 
while we were enemies , we were reconciled to God 
through the death of his Son, much more, being rec¬ 
onciled, shall we be saved by his life,” that is, by the 
living Christ—“Christ in us the hope of glory.” Be 
cause of God’s wondrous love, manifested preeminently 
in the life and death of Jesus, man is “pardoned,” 
freed from his bondage to sin and spiritual death, 
given a new life “from above”—the God life, the love 
life, the very life that was in the Nazarene. But Jesus 
came not only that men might have life but that they 
might have that life “abundantly;” and so the Chris¬ 
tian is ever being saved , being made more and mfore 
sound and whole, as he develops into the image and 
likeness of Christ. Conversion is not an end. It is 
merely a beginning. 

With respect to the future, the Christian is yet to 


Not Saved but Being Saved 57 

be saved—salvation being the glorious consummation 
of which even the beloved disciple could say no more 
than this: “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, 
and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we 
know that, when he shall appear, we shall he like him; 
for we shall see him as he is. And every man that 
hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is 
pure.” 

The past was bondage, from which the Christian 
has been delivered. 

The present is a battle which the Christian is 
fighting—a battle with self, through which conflict he 
becomes more like his Master. 

The future is victory, rest, ease—bondage escaped, 
conflict over, enemies all put to rout, nothing to inter¬ 
fere with the exercise of the higher life of endless ac¬ 
tivity in joyous, loving service. 

It is only when we enter into some understanding 
of what is involved in complete “salvation” that we 
can get the full force of such a familiar passage as 
that which says, “he that endureth to the end, the 
same shall be saved,” or of the promise to the church 
at Ephesus, “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will 
give thee the crown of life.’’ Peter speaks of Chris¬ 
tians as those who are “kept by the power of God 
through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in 
the last time” and Paul expresses his confidence that 
“the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work and 
will save me unto his heavenly kingdom.” “Salvation 
is far from the wicked,” but for him who is being 


What 18 a Christian? 


“>8 


saved “now is our salvation nearer than vviien we be 
lieved” and one day be shall “awake in His likeness’’ 
and cry out with joy, “the Lord Jehovah is become 
my salvation.” 

Out on the western desert are millions of grotesque, 
twisted cactus plants, covered with sharp, dangerous 
thorns -“condemned” plants, for men have said, “they 
are worthless; nothing good can come of them.” But, 
by experiment after experiment, Burbank succeeded 
in developing in the cactus plant a new life which 
gradually overcame the old, natural, cactus life and 
produced a plant that is useful instead of harmful. 
Thus the cactus is no longer “condemned” but being 
saved for some useful function. The change is not 
from without but from within. The thornless cactus 
is not produced by cutting off the thorns but by the de¬ 
velopment of a new life which produces not thorns 
but fruit. The change is not sudden; it is the result 
of a process, the development of a new life. Thus 
natural science comes with its testimony that it is 
possible to transform life; but this has been the tes¬ 
timony of Christian experience for thousands of years, 
and some of us have lived long enough to have wit¬ 
nessed many marvelous transformations of grace. 
Thorns disappeared, fruit developed, men and women 
were transformed by the development of the Christ 
life within. That is “salvation.” 


XI. Not a Ruler but a Servant. 


Doubtless many Christians find satisfaction and 
comfort in the sentiment of that long popular gospel 
hymn, “Dm the Child of a King.” It is not improper 
that they should. The fatherhood of God is a blessed 
truth, and when we think of the heavenly Father’s 
love and care it is cheering to remember that the God 
of love is also the omnipotent God, with limitless re¬ 
sources, so that we can confidently sing, 

“My Father is rich in houses and lands; 

He holdeth the wealth of the world in his hands.” 
While the Christian’s relation to the infinite God 
is beautifully expressed by that figure of speech which 
makes him an adopted Son of the King of Kings and 
a prince of the spiritual realm, yet the Christian spirit 
is not at all like the spirit of the typical prince, who 
jealously holds to his prerogatives as a ruler, reckons 
himself as above his fellows, demands that countless 
courtiers shall minister to his whims as well as to his 
needs. On the contrary, the Christian attitude is in¬ 
variably that of Him who said, “I am in the midst of 
you as he who serveth.” The Christian may be pathet¬ 
ically immature or close to maturity, a dull or a bright 
pupil, often defeated or usually victorious, far from 
holiness in living or remarkably Christlike; but, 
whatever his stage of development, the real Christian 
always possesses something of the spirit which prompts 
him to serve his fellow men. 

—59— 


60 


What Is a Christian? 


It is service which comes nearest to being the 
touchstone of the Christian life. No man is fully com¬ 
petent to judge whether another is really a Christian. 
Only He who knows the hearts of men can render 
unfailing judgment. But the one test which Scripture 
encourages us to apply is the test of service. “By 
their fruits ye shall know them,” said the Master. The 
reason for his repudiation and rejection of some quite 
sure of their own good standing is, “inasmuch as ye 
did it not.” How wonderfully tender and considerate 
Jesus was of persons of whom we would speak as 
great sinners—“He that is without sin among you, 
let him first cast a stone!” How tolerant he was of 
persons outside of his own little circle of disciples— 
“He that is not against us is for us!” Indeed, it was 
on that occasion, when the disciples wanted him to 
put a stop to the activities of a man who “followed 
not us,” that Jesus said “There is no man who shall 
do a mighty work in my name, and be able quickly to 
speak evil of me.” But, on the other hand, w r hen men 
made professions without rendering service, Jesus was 
ready to say, “I never knew you,” and he explained 
that “not every one that saith unto me. Lord, Lord 
shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that 
doeth the will of my Father who is in heaven.” Ac¬ 
cording to the Master’s appraisal of the Christian 
life, the sign of sincerity is service. 

There is no Christian spirit where there is no serv¬ 
ice. Men may prate as they please about their faith, 
but “faith without works is dead” just as a body with 


Not Ruler but Servant 


61 


no spirit in it is dead. Men may testify of their Chris¬ 
tian hope, but “everyone that heareth these words of 
mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a 
foolish man, who built his house upon the sand/’ Men 
may proclaim with fervor their love toward God, but 
“if a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he 
is a liar.” “Whoso hath the world’s goods, and be- 
holdeth his brother in need, and shutteth up his com¬ 
passion from him, how doth the lovej)f God abide in 
him?” In that same passage John tells us that the 
way we know love is “because he laid down his life 
for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the 
brethren,” The spirit that was in Jesus was mani¬ 
fested to the world through loving service, and when 
one is really a Christian, when his ruling purpose is 
in accord with that which actuated Jesus, the Chris¬ 
tian spirit and purpose will be manifested in the same 
manner. “Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear 
much fruit, and so shall ye be my disciples.” “He 
that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth 
much fruit/’ The only faith that is Christian faith 
is “faith that worketh by love.” 

Throughout the ministry of Jesus the utmost promi¬ 
nence is given to the truth that the Christian spirit 
is the spirit of a servant, but never was that truth 
presented so vividly, so emphatically, as when, on 
the last night with his disciples, Jesus proclaimed it 
by both precept and example. It was the hour of the 
last supper. They were together for the solemn fel¬ 
lowship of leave-taking. Yet, even in that hour, so 


G2 


What Is a Christian? 


(deep-seated is human selfishness, there broke out a 
quarrel among the disciples. Each wanted to be 
counted greatest. Each sought the place of honor. 
Each manifested the spirit of the prince and desired 
his own exaltation. Said Jesus: “The kings of the Gen¬ 
tiles have lordship over them”—that is the world’s 
way —“hut ye shall not he so” Then he took a towel 
and a basin and, like a common slave, washed the feet 
of the disciples. 

Notice more carefully what we are told: “He knew 
that his hour was come”—yet, facing death, he paused 
to perform this humble service. He knew “that the 
Father had given all things into his hands*’—yet he 
knelt to wash their feet. He knew that Judas was 
a traitor—yet he washed Judas’ feet! Have we ever 
put those three facts together? At the hour of death— 
the King of Glory—washed the feet of a traitor! 
Why? That thus, sharply, convincingly, he might 
contrast the spirit of self-seeking and the spirit of 
service; that thus he might set forth by deed as well 
as by word the supreme Christ principle— love 'tnani- 
fested in service. Then he said—heed the words—“I 
have given unto you an example, that ye should also do 
as I have done to you .... A servant is not greater 
than his lord. ... If ye know these things, blessed are 
ye if ye do them.” A statement made by George 
Arthur Andrews is hardly too strong when he says 
that one “cannot truly be a Christian unless with 
Christ he has consciously accepted the obligation and 
the privileges of sacrificing service.” 


Not Ruler but Servant 


63 


But, after all, it is the servant of mankind who be¬ 
comes a prince among men. Which type of man do 
we most admire? Is it the one who is a self-seeker, 
who insists that self-preservation is the first law of 
nature; or is it the man who is ready to imperil his 
own life that he may serve another? Is not the latter 
the truly princely man? With respect to power and 
celebrity, there are two courses open. One leads to 
the tyranny of selfishness; the other to the royalty of 
service. Who, after all, have been and are the truly 
great of past and present, the kingly men and queenly 
women? As a rule, not those who ascended thrones 
by right of birth or were lifted thereto by popular 
favor; not those to whom it was given to rule others 
by the scepter of authority. No, the real monarchs 
of mankind have been and are the men and women 
who, through extraordinary service, have ascended 
step by step to enthronement in the universal heart. 
The verdict of the race confirms the teaching of Jesus 
that he who would be greatest must be a sacrificing 
servant. The way to the crown is the way of the cross. 
The Christian is one who walks in that way. 


XII. One With God in Purpose. 


If preceding chapters have left any impression at 
all upon the reader, he will probably agree that those 
impressions may be reduced to and summed up in 
three very simple propositions, as follows: 

The Christian is one whose ruling purpose is to 
realize a divine ideal; 

The Christian is one who is actually making prog¬ 
ress toward the realization of that divine ideal; 

The Christian is one who still has far to go before 
realizing the divine ideal. 

The definition of a Christian which has been kept 
steadily before us is one which may be called univer¬ 
sally inclusive. To be sure, it excludes all who lack 
the purpose as “none of His;” but it includes every 
kind of a Christian. It takes in the strongest, the 
holiest, the most perfect; but it does not exclude the 
weakest “babe in Christ.” 

The real “tie that binds” in one bundle all sorts 
and kinds of Christians is not that they subscribe with 
the same degree of heartiness to a common creed, or 
that they are associated in a common organization, or 
that they are characterized by uniformity of conduct 
under given circumstances, but that, however they 
may differ in other respects, they are bound together 
in one great living family because of their identity of 
purpose. Some are far in advance of others. Some 
—64— 


One With God in Purpose 


65 


march sturdily forward with vigorous strides while 
others lag and Joiter or must frequently rest by the 
wayside. Some have a clear vision of the goal while 
others grope their way in partial blindness. But all 
are alike in this: They are alive and on the way. 

And the goal? Why, it is nothing short of complete 
unity w T ith God! Probably no two men have or can 
have exactly the same conception of just what that 
means, and he attempts a hopeless task who under¬ 
takes to explain the fulness of its meaning. But it 
does not have to be fully explained. Conceive the 
meaning, if you prefer, in the terms of the Oriental 
mystic, or say with his Occidental counterpart that it 
is to be “in tune with the Infinite,” or interpret it 
with the “practical” man as living the simple life of 
self-sacrificing helpfulness that Jesus lived—this mat¬ 
ters little. The essential truth is that the Christian 
is one who presses on toward the goal “unto the prize 
of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” 

And the problem of every day life for the Chris¬ 
tian (though it may not be present as a problem for 
the Not Christian) is what the psychologists ‘call the 
“unification of personality.” Explain it as we will, 
or leave it unexplained, we are day by day face to face 
with the inescapable fact that “the flesh (by which 
Paul means our human nature) lusteth against the 
Spirit (the new ruling purpose) and the Spirit against 
the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other.” 
Complete unity with God in any sense can never be 
attained until this conflict is past and the person him- 




66 


What Is a Christian? 


self is unified, the “Spirit” being dominant. This was 
true of Jesus. He, too, knew the striving of flesh 
against Spirit, but with him the Spirit was always 
victorious and so he manifested to the world a one¬ 
ness with the Father which is the ideal for every 
Christian. Far from that oneness, are we? Truly we 
are; yet here is the glorious and inspiring truth: 

In one respect, in a particular which is fundamental 
to all else, in the very essence of his being, the Chris¬ 
tian is already in unity with God, for he is one with 
God in purpose. Is the Christian one with God in 
that he actually does God’s will at every turn? By 
no means. At least, who has ever discovered such a 
Christian? But the Christian is one with God to this 
extent: He wills to do just what God wills to have 
him do. What may be called the determinative will 
of the Christian is already in accord with the will of 
God, this being the one essential fact which makes 
him a Christian; and in this determinative will are 
W'rapped up all of the possibilities, nay, all of the cer¬ 
tainties, of ultimate achievement. As all that ulti¬ 
mately appears in the most remarkable human life— 
all of physical stature and strength, all of intellectual 
power, all of the dreams and designs and ambitions 
which manifest themselves in sciemce and art and 
music—lie enfolded wdthin the insignificant germ of 
life, the human protoplasm, so all that the spiritual 
man may become are wrapped up in that heaven-born 
ruling purpose which is the basis of achievement in 
the spiritual sphere. 


One With God in Purpose 


67 


There is a remarkable passage of Scripture which 
brings us in clearest terms the truth here set forth, 
but to get its force let us retrace our steps for a mo¬ 
ment and recall our tentative definition of a Christian: 
“A Christian is one whose ruling purpose in life is 
to become conformed , not only outwardy in conduct 
but inwardly in mind and spirit, to the divine ideal, 
as manifested in Jesus Christ.” That expresses the 
Christian purpose with respect to his own life. Now 
what is God’s purpose concerning human life? What 
Would God have men to be? Here is the answer as 
given by Paul in the eighth chapter of his epistle to 
the Romans. “Whom he foreknew, he also foreordained 
for predestined) to be conformed to the image of his 
Son!” “Predestination?” Is anyone afraid of the 
term? Does any one rebel against it? Here is its 
meaning made manifest: It is God’s purpose, God’s 
good pleasure, that men should be conformed to the 
image of his Son! 

What is the meaning of this truth for the Chris¬ 
tian? It has wonderful meaning. It means that the 
Infinite God is vyith him in the working out of his pur¬ 
pose in life, and “if God be for us, who can be against 
us?*’ Yes, the Christian is conscious of being dis¬ 
tressingly lacking when he ventures to compare him¬ 
self with the divine ideal; but one thing he has: He 
has a ruling purpose which is in accord with the divine 
purpose, and in this purpose lie all of the possibilities 
of the divine likeness and all the certainty of divine 
cooperation. And when the Christian discovers that 


68 


What Is a Christian? 


God’s purpose and his own purpose are in accord, he 
also discovers that he is certainly on the right track in 
being a Christian; for, however else made manifest, 
God’s purpose is manifested preeminently in Jesus 
Christ. Otold God made known his purpose “by div¬ 
ers portions and in divers manners”—through the 
prophets, for instance, as when Micah said: “He hath 
showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth Je¬ 
hovah require of thee, but to do justly, and to love kind¬ 
ness, and to walk humbly with thy God”—but in the 
latter days God revealed himself and his purpose “in 
his Son,” who is “the express image of his person.” 

God’s purpose for man is that a man become like 
Christ. 

The Christian is one whose ruling purpose in life 
is in accord with the divine purpose—to become like 
Jesus Christ. 

There is a thought even more inspiring than that 
of personal attainment. It is that to be a Christian 
means to be a living factor in working out the Eternal 
Father’s “bright design” in the creation of man—the 
realization of himself in sonship. “We are laborers 
together with God.” To what end? In the beginning 
God said, “Let us make man in our own image.” Christ 
is the image of the invisible God. To be a Christian, 
to be dominated by the purpose to become like Christ, 
is to cooperate with God in the realization of his eter¬ 
nal purpose, his ultimate aim—a family of Christ-like 
sons, which will he the kingdom of heaven on earth. 


WHAT IS IT TO BELIEVE ON CHRIST? 


There is no more familiar, and no truer, state¬ 
ment in the English language than the familiar Bible 
words, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
shalt be saved.” It is the Golden Text of the Chris¬ 
tian message concerning the way of eternal life. Mul¬ 
titudes have acted upon the counsel of Paul to the Phil¬ 
ippian jailer and have been able to testify that from 
the very moment of such action they were conscious of 
a newness of life which developed with the passing 
years, and of a “witness of the Spirit” which brought 
assurance of forgiveness and a sense of peace and con¬ 
fidence. Christians may not always mean the same 
thing when they use the word “salvation,” but all 
through the centuries they have found that the sense of 
salvation follows the act of faith involved in the words 
“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” 

Yet many have been perplexed and disturbed be¬ 
cause of conflicting answers to the question, “What is 
it to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ?” Such was 
the writer’s personal experience, and others have con¬ 
fessed to the same perplexity. We have heard preach¬ 
ers say: “It means to believe that Jesus was the Son 
of God; that Jesus died for sinners; that he arose 
from the dead.” Yet we have known people who be¬ 
lieved all of these things—and much else that is true 
—about Christ, but who had no experience of personal 
salvation in any sense of that word. 

—69— 


70 


What Is a Christian? 


Furthermore, many of us have been puzzled by 
this fact: We have been taught—and truly taught— 
that men who lived before Christ were all saved by 
faith in Christ, if saved at all; for “there is none other 
name.” Yet their faith could not have been a belief 
that Jesus was the Son of God, or that he arose from 
the dead, or any other belief about Jesus, his teaching 
or his works, simply because Jesus had not yet been 
born. Such perplexity concerning the familiar text 
is sure to persist until we come to see that the essence 
of Christian faith is to establish a personal relation¬ 
ship with Jesus Christ. To believe on Christ is not 
merely to believe something about him but, as it is 
expressed in the Westminster Confession of Faith 
it is “accepting, receiving, and resting upon Christ”— 
which is the establishment of a personal relationship. 
A study of the question, therefore, involves two other 
questions: First, With whom is the relationship es¬ 
tablished? Secondly, How is the relationship estab¬ 
lished? 

Of course, any Christian would answer the first 
question by saying, “Why, the relationship is to be 
established with Christ.” True. Yet, strange to say, 
many persons overlook this important fact: It is im¬ 
possible to establish a personal relationship except 
with a living person. Saving faith is the establish¬ 
ment of a relationship with One who is. Let us try 
to get this distinction clearly: The question who is 
Christ? is very different from the question, Who was 
Jesus? Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, was God 


What Is It To Believe on Christ? 71 

manifest in the flesh. The writer and his readers all be¬ 
lieve that firmly. Yet we are confronted by the fact that 
the God-man is not now present with us in the flesh. 
He went away. Either he no longer is living and pres¬ 
ent in any sense, or else his presence is of some other 
kind, for he is certainly not present with us in bodily 
form. As Paul said: “Even though we have known 
Christ after the flesh, yet now we know him so no 
more”; and Peter speaks of Christ as “being put to 
death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit.” Who, 
then, is Christ? 

Two clear answers come from Bible teaching. The 
first is, Christ is God. While among men in human 
form he said, “He that believeth on me, believeth not 
on me, but on him that sent me.” The God-man, Jesus 
of Nazareth, passed away from physical presence 
among men; but before going he made it plain that 
he would still be with his disciples “all the days.” He 
ceased to appear as man, but he did not cease to exist 
as God. As then, so now, to believe on Christ is to 
believe on God. This teaching is most prominent in 
the Gospel of John. The first chapter assures of these 
truths: “The Word” (a word is the expression or man¬ 
ifestation or embodiment of a thought) existed “in 
the beginning,” “was with God,” “was God.” “And 
the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” In the 
fourteenth chapter Jesus asserts: “I am in the Father, 
and the Father in me.” Many other similar passages 
identify Christ with God and go to show that to es- 


72 


What Is a Christian? 


tablisli a personal relationship with Christ means to 
establish a personal relationship with the eternal God. 

But another teaching is clear: Christ is God mani¬ 
festing himself among men. Space will not permit 
a detailed study of the statement, but three outstand¬ 
ing truths are made plain in the Bible. The first 
is that God manifested himself to men before his mani¬ 
festation in “the Son of man.” That means that Christ 
was present with men before the period of the thirty- 
three years in human form. The second is that the 
supreme manifestation was when “the Word became 
flesh.” The third is that when no longer on earth in 
the flesh Christ continued to manifest himself. He 
arose from the dead. He appeared to many. Even 
after his ascension he manifested himself—as to Paul, 
for instance. All of this is related in the Bible, but 
ever since the Bible was written he has continued to 
manifest himself and, through faith, men have estab¬ 
lished personal relationships with the living Christ, 
who is one with the Father. That is what it means 
to believe on Christ. 

Having found that to believe on Christ means to 
establish a personal relationship with a living person, 
the second question is, “How is that relationship estab¬ 
lished?” or “what is saving faith?” 

What minister has not heard people say, “I do be¬ 
lieve, but I am not saved”? Yet Jesus repeatedly de¬ 
clared that he that believeth “hath eternal life” and 
“hath passed out of death into life.” Clearly the peo¬ 
ple who say that they believe and yet are not saved 


What Is It To Believe on Christ? 


73 


are mistaken as to their faith. You believe in God? 
“The devils also believe, and tremble.’’ You believe 
that Jesus was the Son of God? That he died for 
sinners? That he died for you? That salvation is 
“by faith”? Well, one may believe all this and much 
more and yet not believe on Christ for salvation. 

It is clear when we pause to think about it that to 
have faith in the truth of some statement made to us 
by credible witnesses is quite different from having 
faith in, or believing on, a person. To believe some¬ 
thing about what Jesus was and did is one thing, but 
to accept, receive and rest upon Christ involves not 
merely the acceptance of evidence but a personal act 
based upon that evidence. An illustration may make 
the thought clearer: 

You know about the postal system of our country. 
You know that there is a great organization in exist¬ 
ence for the purpose of taking a letter you may write 
and delivering it to the person addressed. You not 
only know about, but you have faith in that system. 
You believe it to be a good system, one that rarely 
fails its patrons. Yet such belief about the system 
will not of itself get your letter to its destination. 
But you believe more. You believe that this whole 
great system is absolutely at your disposal; that, while 
used by many, it exists in a very true sense for your 
personal benefit—to carry your particular letter to 
one particular person; that all that you have to do 
is to drop your letter in a mail box and all the rest 
will be done for you. That is great faith, without 


74 


What Is a Christian? 


question; yet if your faith includes nothing more than 
this you might stand until you faint with the letter 
in your hand and the letter would go no farther. What 
is it to believe on the postal system ? Why, it is to take 
your letter and drop it in the box. Not until you let 
go of it, not until you entrust it to the persons ap¬ 
pointed to see that it is delivered, do you really be¬ 
lieve on the postal system. Even so to believe on 
Christ means essentially to entrust ourselves to him. 

There is a remarkably illuminating text in the first 
chapter of Second Timothy which sheds light on our 
question. Paul says, "I know whom I have believed 
(or trusted) and am persuaded that he is able to keep 
that which I have committed unto him.” There are 
three words in that text which illustrate the essen¬ 
tials of faith—know, trust, commit. These words 
suggest that faith is an act of the whole man, includ¬ 
ing intellect, sensibilities and will—I know—I trust—I 
commit—and there is no true faith in Christ until 
one goes beyond knowledge and beyond trust and 
reaches the point of committal. To be sure, there is 
a deeper and truer knowledge which comes from ex¬ 
perience, and it is in that sense that Paul uses the 
word here; but ordinary knowledge comes mostly 
through evidence presented by others, and this is an 
element of faith. We must know about Christ; we 
must have confidence in Christ; we must commit our¬ 
selves to Christ. That is saving faith. 

Merely to know is not enough. One might know 
everything that can be known about Christ, but such 


What Is It To Believe on Christ? 


75 


knowledge would not bring salvation. Indeed it would 
constitute what has been called “mere head religion”— 
though really it is not religion at all. Further, just 
to trust, to have confidence in, is not enough. This 
is mere faith of the sensibilities, so to speak, and, 
in contrast to “mere head religion,” it might fairly 
be called mere heart religion. It goes no farther than 
the feelings. Something else is necessary'—an act 
of the will—committal. We may know a person, may 
have full confidence in him, but it is not until we 
commit something to him that we really “believe on” 
that person. 

Our dealings with a bank afford an excellent illus¬ 
tration, and such dealings are suggested by the text 
quoted above, for the word translated “committed” 
might as well be translated “deposited.” Let us sup¬ 
pose that we have some money to be kept safely. What 
is involved in getting that money deposited in a bank? 
First of all we must know that there is such an in¬ 
stitution as a bank. Secondly we must reach the place, 
if we have not reached it already, where we have con¬ 
fidence that a bank will keep our money safely. Yet 
we might know all about banks and have the utmost 
confidence in them and still have our money burned 
or stolen. What is the essential step? It is that we 
actually deposit the money in the bank, commit it to 
the safe keeping of the institution which exists for 
that purpose. Then, and not until then, is the money 
safe. 

Some may remember that in his evangelistic meet- 


76 


What Is a Christian? 


ings Mr. Moody had a habit of calling upon those who 
were ready to become Christians to arise in the public 
audience and say, "I will.” It was not enough that 
their minds were instructed and their hearts warm 
with confidence in Christ. It was essential that they 
take the step of committal by act of the will. To believe 
on Christ is to deposit ourselves with him, for his 
keeping, his guidance, his use, that he may develop 
us into his likeness—“unto the perfect man.” 

The relation of faith to feeling perplexes some 
Christians and light may be shed upon this subject by 
considering the emotions aroused in different people 
who make use of the same bank for the safeguarding 
of their funds. There are those who exercise faith 
in Christ and immediately experience a wealth of 
joyous feeling. There are others who as truly believe 
on Christ and yet know almost nothing of the “expe¬ 
rience” of peace and joy of which friends testify. Fre¬ 
quently such persons are disturbed and concerned lest 
their faith is not genuine, thinking that the joyous 
feeling must always follow true faith. It is well for 
such to remember that our feelings are always invol¬ 
untary and that they depend altogether on the state 
of mind in which an act is committed. 

Turn again to our illustration of the bank. Let 
us suppose that three men come one after the other 
to the teller’s Avindow. The first is a business man, 
making his daily deposit. He has appeared at the 
bank almost every day for years and he has always 
found his money safely cared for. Naturally enough 


What Is It To Believe on Christ? 


77 


he has no particular feeling about the transaction. 
He just makes his deposit and turns away, neither 
joyous nor unhappy. The second is an express agent. 
There has been sent to him a shipment of gold, for 
which he is responsible. He has felt the responsibility 
keenly. He has been fearful lest he might be robbed. 
Even as he stands at the window, he casts furtive 
eyes upon every person who draws near, lest some 
bandit is seeking his gold. At length his turn comes 
and he passes his sack of gold through the window 
and sees it placed within the burglar-proof vault. Hav¬ 
ing perfect confidence in the safety of the bank, he 
turns away with a light heart, rejoicing that at last 
his gold is safe. 

The third depositor is a man from far back in the 
mountains, ignorant and unused to modern ways. He 
sold his little farm and was paid cash. For weeks 
he kept the money “in his sock.” He hid it first one 
place then another. He worried constantly lest some 
one should steal his all. At length he told a friend 
about his anxiety. “Why don’t you go to town and 
put it in a bank?” asked the friend. But he had never 
heard of a bank. “What is a bank?” he asked. He 
learned that it was a place with a strong vault for 
the very purpose of keeping money safely. For the 
first time in his life he knew how to find “salvation” 
for his money. But the money was still unsafe. Knowl¬ 
edge alone did not assure its safety. Then came an¬ 
other problem: Could he trust the bank ? He asked 
friend after friend. Each assured him that banks 


78 


What Is a Christian? 


could be trusted. He became convinced—at least part¬ 
ly convinced—that his money would be safe if he 
should deposit it in the bank. He started to town, his 
money with him; though still it wasn’t safe. He came 
to the teller’s window. He explained what was wanted. 
He asked many questions. At last he passed the money 
to the teller; but he had scarcely let go of his wealth 
until he made a grab to get it back. Finally, how¬ 
ever, he left the money in the bank and walked out, 
but he was downcast and worried still. 

Try to picture to yourself these three men as they 
cannot be portrayed in limited space, and then ask 
yourself this question: Whose money was safest? What 
effect did the feelings—or lack of feeling—of these men 
have upon the safety of their deposits? If only we 
entrust ourselves, commit ourselves, without reserva¬ 
tion, unto Him who has all power in heaven and in 
earth, whatever our feelings may be, he will keep the 
priceless possession which we commit to him through¬ 
out all the days and even “against that day.” “Believe 
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.” 

The consideration of one other question may be 
helpful to some. What is the relation between faith 
and “works?” Borne are unable to reconcile the teach¬ 
ings of the Bible on these subjects. The fact is that 
they cannot be reconciled if “faith” is no more than 
the acceptance of a creed or belief about Jesus and 
his teachings and deeds. The Bible tells us that we 
are “saved by faith,” yet Paul, the apostle of faith, 
insists that those who do not live clean, true, loving 


What Is It To Believe on Christ? 


79 


lives “shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” Read 
such a passage as the latter part of the fifth chapter 
of Galatians. Remember also the teachings of Jesus— 
“by their fruits (not their “faith”) ye shall know 
them.” He taught plainly that not all who profess 
faith in him shall enter the kingdom of heaven, “but 
he that doeth the will of my Father who is in heaven.” 

It is when we remember that to believe on Christ 
means to commit ourselves to him so that he may work 
in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure 
that the relation of faith to good works becomes clear. 
Such surrender to Christ means that we let him be¬ 
come the master of our lives and, while we cannot 
“reach heaven at a single bound,” his spirit within 
gradually builds us into his own likeness “from glory 
to glory,” which means, from character to character. 
“Faith without works is dead,” says James, and this 
comment suggests what is true—that there is a dead 
and merely formal faith, but that there is also a vital 
faith which so connects the individual with Christ 
that he is “born from above” and begins at once to 
manifest the divine life in thought and word and deed. 

The faith which saves is a “faith that worketh by 
love.” It is that surrender of the self to God which 
means that from the moment of surrender the indi¬ 
vidual shall no longer live “after the flesh” but “after 
the Spirit”; and so yield the “fruit of the Spirit,” 
which appears not all at once in perfection, but like 
the fruit of a tree—bud and blossom and slowly ripen¬ 
ing fruit. The inevitable consequences of vital faith 


80 


What Is a Christian? 


in Christ are Christ-like character and Christ-like ser¬ 
vice. True faith means the establishment and main¬ 
tenance of that connection with the God who is Love 
which necessarily results in the manifestation of the 
fruits of the love-life. The tree is known by its fruit. 
“If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none 
of his,” but “Christ in you” is “the hope of glory.” 
Salvation is through the indwelling Christ. Faith 
opens the door and lets him in. 



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